


All for the love of...

by litsasecret



Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Dubious Consent, M/M, Mpreg, Omega Verse, Sibling Incest, Soul Bond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-31
Updated: 2012-07-31
Packaged: 2017-11-11 03:41:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/474117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/litsasecret/pseuds/litsasecret
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Omegaverse fic wherein Mikey Way has always been bonded, and that sucks about as much as one would expect. (Mikey and Frank are Omegas, everyone else is an Alpha.)</p>
<p>Or: Happy endings and love are for Betas.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All for the love of...

**Author's Note:**

  * For [inoru_no_hoshi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/inoru_no_hoshi/gifts).



> Special thanks to Valress for the beta.

When Mikey was 16 and went into heat for the first time, it took him by surprise. His very first thought when his skin started feeling too tight was "I need Gerard." His second was to get himself to one of the teenage Omega outreach centers to see if they could find him a suitable Alpha for his first time.

He acted on that second thought, of course, because if he'd phoned Gerard, he'd just have freaked out and probably tried to set him up with a Beta, which would, if the pamphlets the school handed out to every student above a certain age were any indication, be rather less than ideal.

So he got himself to an outreach center, managed to fill out the forms they handed him with shaking hands, and told the Omega's counselor they'd assigned (because he was in heat, sort of like a guardian ad litem only without the ad litem part,) that he'd thought he was a Beta. He'd never had any of the indications he was an Omega until about two hours previous, after all.

The counselor had smiled and told him that these things happened, especially if he was close friends with any Alphas. Apparently, Gee had been "stabilizing" him his whole life or something, who knew?

(Her smile had slipped when he'd managed to tell her about Gerard, mentioned he was his brother. He didn't think about it until much, much later.)

He met Frank there, an Omega with a more traditional upbringing and anger in his eyes, and he learned more about what being a proper Omega entailed from him than anywhere else. He learned enough to know that he was glad for Gerard and whatever pheromones he'd been spewing at him his whole life to make him think he was a Beta.

When he called Gerard to let him know, he could hear him take that first swig of vodka. He didn't know it at the time, but that soft swish and the little noise of him swallowing would fill him up with guilt and pain for a long, long time.

"Gender is stupid anyway, Mikes. Don't worry about it, okay? And introduce Frank to mom. She'll look after him, right?"

Mikey had agreed, and Frank had become a regular fixture at their house, and he and Frank learned everything they could about sex from each other, so the next time they had to visit the center, they wouldn't freak out.

(Mikey hadn't freaked out. He'd run the gamut from "What the fucking fuck?" to "Well, fuck you too, biology," in the time it had taken him to recognize the symptoms of heat to arriving at the center. But Frank had, and Mikey was as good at keeping quiet as Frank and Gerard were at talking, so Frank never did find out.)

***

The first time he goes into heat while in Gerard's vicinity, they're in the van, literally. On their way to some shitty venue where they'll rile some kids up and pray for applause and no riot.

He feels it creep up on him like walking into a lake in summer, like water inching over his skin, leaving goose bumps in its path. Frank realizes first, his nostrils flaring and pupils dilating, and Mikey's never induced sympathy heat in Frank before, never thought it likely (it's fairly rare even in bonded Omegas, and he's hardly met anyone who gave him that _spark_ they say is the signal for bonding.) but nothing about Mikey's gender and sexuality has been normal before, so why start now.

He clamps down on his urges and thinks that if Frank is going into sympathy with him, they'll be able to get off before the show and worry about it later. But then Brian notices and he leans across, all territorial Alpha and pheromones making Mikey want to go belly up and bare his throat, and says "I had no idea you guys were Omegas, God, you _smell_ \--"

Gerard goes territorial in a flash and _shoves_ , and Brian hits the filthy floor of the van with a dull thud and a groan.

"Back. Off." Gerard snarls, practically radiating hatred. "Mine."

And Mikey looks at Frank and how small he's made himself against the seat, and jealousy surges deep inside. And that's when it clicks together, like a really ugly Rubik's cube or something, and he can see his first Omega's counselor's smile fading from her lips when he mutters "Gerard's an Alpha. My brother."

Ray cranes around and looks at Mikey, and he says, "Do you want me or Brian, or should we ask one of the other bands?"

Mikey buries his face in his hands and starts shaking uncontrollably, like the whole world's tearing apart around him.

He hears Gerard mutter, "Frankie, baby, come here, shh."

"I don't want _anyone_ ," Mikey says, dull and numb. Then: "Gender is fucking stupid anyway. Find me a fucking Beta or something, I don't _care_. Find me a toy or experimental suppression therapy or... I. Don't. Care."

Gerard has his face pressed against Frank's throat, and they're rutting together, Frank keening.

Brian pulls himself up off the floor and gathers Mikey close. "Shh, come on, you don't mean it."

Mikey means it, he really does, so it doesn't really matter that Brian is stripping him naked and pulling him into his lap, does it?

After that day, Mikey watches Gerard spiral outofcontrol with his alcohol, with his drugs and his self-loathing, and he ignores it.

He sleeps with a different Alpha every heat, and then a different Alpha every week, every night. He becomes known as the scene slut.

He smirks at the title and wears his makeup thick and dark, rips holes in his clothes and lets Gerard lick him and mark him during stage shows.

He tries to ignore the Gerard issue, but Mikey can't stop himself from _always_ thinking about him, and sometimes Gerard sleeps on top of him, alcohol soaked and stinking with it, and still smelling perfect. Safe.

***

He's curled up in his bunk one night, reading one of Frank's books and trying not to think about the party he's not at right now, when Gerard stumbles in and sicks up, mostly making it in a trash can, but somewhat not. Mikey can't bring himself to care that it's going to be somehow his fault come morning. (It's so rarely Gerard's fault-- and Mikey would resent that, but he'd have to stop being at the forefront of the campaign to _not blame Gerard_ for that, so... he just ignores it.)

When Gerard stumbles and falls on top of Mikey and whispers his name, Mikey can't help the way his body surges under that singular focus. Gerard starts chanting it, and it's mixed together with a slurred litany of apologies, and then Gerard is licking his neck and reaching between them to undo Mikey's fly. "I love you, God, I love you Mikey, please, I love you," he mutters, and then he's biting Mikey's collarbone with a ferocity that draws blood and closing a fist around Mikey's dick, and all he can think is _wrong, wrong, wrong,_ and all he can do is dig fingers into Gerard's shoulders and drag him closer and whisper "Yes, Gerard, please," and it should be the worst sex of his life, with Gerard all confused about his whiskey-dick and filthy with vomit and whatever _party_ he'd come from, but he smells like _Alpha_ and safety and belonging, and Mikey comes harder than he's ever come, seeing the black of space like he's floating, like he's dying.

Once Gerard passes out, Mikey pulls himself out from under him and goes to half-heartedly wipe up his mess. He should go find a shower or a hose or a public bathroom, but he smells like sex and his Alpha, so he doesn't. It's weird, he thinks, that he feels like he's going into heat when he just had _spectacular_ sex. (Awful sex. It should have been the least satisfying drunken hookup of his life.)

He pokes at the blood on his collarbone and thinks about bonds and how they can't ever, ever be broken. He thinks about how fucked up he is.

When Frank stumbles in, he's not even close to as drunk as he's pretending, and Mikey watches the way his gaze settles on Gerard; a fond, disgusted, worried expression settling across his face, and he feels that same sick jealousy he had the last time he'd induced sympathy heat in Frank.

It gives him an idea; possibly the shittiest one he's had in the entirety of his existence. He drags Frank away from his Gerard-contemplation and into a searing, cruel kiss, and Frank protests a little bit, mumbling "C'mon, Mikey, what?" against his lips, which Mikey ignores in favor of dragging them flush against each other, so Frank can feel how hard he is already (not that he'd know why Mikey _shouldn't_ be hard, but still--)

Frank pulls away after a brief scuffle, but Mikey can smell the pheromones coming off him in waves and he feels _powerful_ that he can induce heat in other Omegas, just by trying, and Frank gives him this wide-eyed innocent look that reminds Mikey of the first time they ever had sex, fumbling with lube and trying not to actually say shit like "dick" or "ass".

"Didn't think you were due to go into heat for like... two weeks."

"Took something funny," Mikey lies, and he leans in again, not to kiss but to inhale, and Frank sniffs him back, burying his face in Mikey's hair. He wonders if Frank can smell the lie on his skin, or if he just assumes that Mikey smells like Gerard and sex by proxy.

"I'm not gonna help with that," Frank says. 

"No, you're not gonna fix it, but you can sure as fuck--" Mikey strips Frank out of his shirt with a deftness that comes from long practice "help. Promise. Oh, _God,_ Frankie."

Frank giggles, and then it really is just like before, with them rutting against each other still half-clothed and Frank coming first because he's an overeager little brat, and Mikey needing Frank to talk him over the edge, several minutes behind. (Frank and Gerard are very good at talking through Mikey's silence. Frank and Gerard--)

When they disentangle, Frank leers at Mikey, all heat-induced horniness, and says "Fun as that was, I'm gonna go bunk with an Alpha. There're at least four parties still on right now, I think you'll be fine."

Mikey will always wonder whether Frank was being coy because he was Frank, or because he guessed the truth. Either way, it wasn't like Mikey didn't notice the way Frank had snuggled up on top of Gerard as Mikey stepped out of the bus into the humid, sticky night.

He finds a party, like Frank suggested, and lays himself out on a couch and watches as three Alphas scuffle drunkenly over who gets to have him, and then lets them all fuck him, one after another.

It isn't even half as satisfying as Gerard's drunken fumbling, which he refuses to think about.

***

The second time it happens, it's much the same as the first, only Mikey stays away from Frank afterwards because inducing heat once is a fluke, twice is coincidence, and three times is a pattern he really doesn't want to think about.

He stays away from everyone, even going so far as to rent a hotel room for an hour to scrub the sweat and come and Gerard's Alpha-scent from his skin, until Ray finds him.

Ray has never, ever been even _close_ to what Mikey needs, and this time isn't any different, but he's in heat and foggy with it, desperate and needy enough that he doesn't protest the way Ray lays him out and worships his body with tongue and fingers before pressing inside him with single-minded intensity that only Ray can muster.

"Love you," Ray mumbles into Mikey's sweat-soaked skin, and Mikey doesn't reply. He doesn't say much of anything, anymore, and this doesn't seem like the time to start.

After that is when Mikey really stops caring, starts fucking anyone who wants him as long as it isn't Gerard, because Mikey's fucked up, and so's Gerard, but he refuses to make it any worse.

Frank gives him censorious looks and Ray tries to talk to him and Brian leaves condoms and informational pamphlets all over the place. Mikey ignores them all.

***

The whole time Gerard spends drying out, white and shaking and forcing himself to go on with everything, Mikey doesn't go into heat. It's almost two months before he notices, and four before anyone else does, and even then it's a near stranger.

Pete's pretty and lithe and an Alpha with an Omega's disposition, all sweetness and vulnerability and smiles, and he walks right up to Mikey when they're first introduced, sniffs his throat, and frowns.

"When's the last time you had a heat, dude?" he asks, facial expression halfway between a frown of concern and the previous grinning leer he'd been wearing.

Mikey stops, literally pauses, breath and pulse and brain on hold, but then he pulls out his Sidekick and pages back through the calendar and stares at where it says it's been months, and he looks back up at Pete.

"How." Mikey says, long since having given up whole sentences, because no one expects the scene slut to actually _talk_ , just lie back and moan like a whore.

"You smell wrong, like you got hurt real bad. And that usually leads to people suppressing heats on their own, no drugs needed."

He leans in and tugs Mikey to his side. "There's a lot of Alphas on this scene who could've hurt you, dude, so I'm not gonna play guessing games. But stick with me and we'll take all of them by storm."

Mikey sucks in that breath he'd stopped on and then lets it out, and he allows Pete to scent him again, allows the soft comment that maybe he needs a shower and Pete knows where the hoses are, and he lets Pete drag him away and strip him down and...

And nothing but cold water and borrowed soap and he knows about baptism, but he'd never really thought about it before.

"I think I'm bonded to an Alpha," he tells Pete, and it's the first time he's said it aloud.

"Yeah, I caught that in your scent too. It's cool, man, no judgment here."

Pete's hands are up in a conciliatory gesture and that grinning leer is back in full force and Mikey can't help but smile in response.

"Okay, it's a fact: Mikeyway smiles are the best," Pete says, and Mikey blushes scarlet to his toes, and he knows he'll follow Pete to the end of the earth.

Gerard doesn't approve, and it's like the sun coming up that he's noticing Mikey again, so Mikey continues to see Pete, holding hands between the buses, kissing behind amplifiers, letting Pete fuck him in cheap hotel rooms, draw him into heat and tie with him.

After, Pete presses his face to Mikey's abdomen and giggles. "We'd make truly awful parents, you and I." Mikey lays his hand next to Pete's face and digs his fingers into that soft spot on his belly, halfway between his pelvis and his navel, and doesn't disagree.

They'd make truly awful parents, but God would their babies be beautiful.

"Can an Omega even get pregnant by an Alpha when he's bonded to someone else?" Mikey asks, because Pete's been teaching him to talk again, full sentences with inflection and meaning.

Pete grimaces, and Mikey can feel it. "Did you _have_ to bring that up, Mikeyway? Seriously, I was afterglowy."

Mikey sighs. He won't apologize if he doesn't mean it.

"Who is it, anyway?" Pete asks, and Mikey winces.

"That bad? Huh. Frank thinks it's Brian, but I told him that would be way more exploitation than Brian would go for, and then _he_ said that your very first heat on tour, Brian took care of you, which is totally gross, but whatever, it's heat, you know?"

Mikey groans. "If I let you fuck me again will you shut up?"

Pete goes still and quiet. "Let me fuck you?" he asks, and his tone is so calm and even that Mikey has to look at him. Pete doesn't _do_ calm and even.

"Uh," Mikey says, repeating the sentence in his head a couple of times. Pete's never had issues with his language before, but it is pretty un-Omega-like. "Let you have sex with me?" he offers after a second.

"I'd like to think that having sex, _fucking_ , is something we do together."

Mikey blinks. "Well, yeah, otherwise it'd be masturbation," he says.

"You said 'let me fuck you,' not..." Pete trails off, then sighs.

"Does it matter?" Mikey asks.

"Words always matter, Mikeyway," Pete says, and it sounds so bittersweet that Mikey sucks in a breath to protest. "But yeah, I think fucking each other again is a good idea. Roll over, baby. I'll make you feel so good it hurts."

Mikey snorts out a laugh and complies, and Pete's hands across his skin make him feel special, so he forgets the conversation and relaxes. Pete does make him feel so good it hurts, and this time when they pull apart, he passes out.

When he wakes up, he sees that Pete's used his lipstick to write goodbye in scrawling letters across his arm, and all he can think is that words matter one helluva lot after all.

Without really considering the consequences, he makes his way back to the buses, to _their_ bus, and falls into Gerard's bunk, biting his lip hard enough he won't cry, and wraps himself up in Gerard's Alpha-scent and hides.

Not _well_ or really successfully, but no one but Gerard will bother him when he's quiet and hiding, and he _needs_ Gerard right now, craves him with every fiber of his being, skin lonely and raw despite the way Pete had touched him all over just hours before.

He refuses to cry.

When Gerard finds him, he doesn't hesitate to pull Mikey in close and pet him, and Mikey burrows his face against his throat and _breathes_.

When his Sidekick buzzes between them, Mikey pulls it out to read the message to a soft rant of Gerard's protests.

"u could just tell me who"

"who what" Mikey types, even though he knows exactly what Pete means.

"You ever think that maybe you treat heartbreak a little lightly?" Gerard asks, "Because I do."

"I owe him."

"What? What could you _possibly_ owe him! He left the night after your heat! No Alpha would--"

"I owe him words," Mikey says. "Words always matter."

And that's one of Gerard's truths too, so it shuts him up long enough for Mikey to read Pete's text.

"u kno"

Mikey stares at it, and considers. He does owe Pete, after everything.

"gee" he types, each letter like a stone under his fingers. Pete-- Pete is his everything, but Gerard will _always_ be more.

Pete responds with four texts in rapid progression:

"oh"

"shouldve guessed really"

"thats pretty fucked up, mikeyway"

"still friends and friends help friends with really dumb bonds promises are like daisychains in a park"

Mikey types out "ex-friends?"

"mikeyway, exes can be friends and i remember my daisychains"

After a second, Mikey breathes in Gerard's scent and exhales on a sob, then types, the letters blurring together. "not us, probably."

"daisychains"

And then nothing; nothing save the sound of Gerard's heartbeat echoing through his mind.

And a promise, like blood and brothers and bonds and everything that isn't a daisychain in the park in summertime. "Mikes, I love you, okay?"

"I hate being an Omega," Mikey says.

"Gender is stupid, Mikes. Hating stupid shit is perfectly acceptable."

"I hate bonds," Mikey replies, without thinking. He should have thought, because Gerard will make the wrong conclusion from that statement.

Gerard's arms stiffen around Mikey, and he snarls a little, all Alpha possessiveness for a glorious moment. Then he forces himself to relax and pet Mikey some more.

"There are therapists for unwanted bonds. We'll figure this out, Mikey, promise."

Mikey chokes on a laugh, and thinks about how much he would prefer daisychains to blood.

***

They write the Black Parade and Mikey gets crazier and crazier until Gerard cracks and tells the band that he bonded with Pete and Pete denied him. It's something like the truth, and it gets him sympathy and attention, neither of which he particularly wanted; both of which he takes in like a sponge, like he's been craving attention his whole life and never gotten it until now.

It makes it extremely difficult to keep his pregnancy a secret, and he feels guilty for that, but he doesn't want to share yet.

He and Pete will have a beautiful baby, even if Mikey can't pretend daisychains are strong enough to trump blood.

When they find him a therapist, he blurts everything out to her at once, a tumble of words that are like a waterfall, but words matter, and she listens like they do, eyes wide and unflinching.

"I think me and Gee have been bonded since I was born, and that's why I never knew I was Omega until my first heat, and then I fell in love with Pete and now I'm pregnant with his baby, but I didn't tell him everything soon enough to matter, and now he hates me and Gerard thinks I bonded with _Pete_ , but he doesn't know about the baby, and I don't want Gerard to hate Pete or Pete to hate me even though I basically deserve all of this, and I don't know what to do."

All females are Betas, he knows, and they always say that Betas can't understand, but she nods and scratches notes or doodles in her notebook, and he feels lighter all at once, just having said it all.

"Why don't we start with the pregnancy. How far along are you?"

He counts backwards and says "Four months, I guess? Five?" 

She nods. "So, termination isn't as simple as it could be--"

"No!" Mikey says, and it surprises him, his vehemence. "I mean, no, sorry-- thank you, I respect that everyone has a right to choose but…"

She smiles, and it seems like she thinks she’s smarter than Mikey. He wonders why she’s playing him. “Why do you want this child so badly, when, by your own admission, it’s another facet of the problems you're having?"

"Because me and Pete will have the most beautiful babies," Mikey mumbles, and it sounds stupid out loud, but he wants Pete to teach their child how to make daisychains, wants Gerard to play at being uncle and teach them how to play pretend. He wants Frank to tell them stories and he wants...

"Right," the therapist says, and sighs a little. "Tell me why you think you're bonded to Gerard? The odds of a biological-sibling bond are..." she trails off.

Mikey stares at her, and she nods slightly to encourage him. "Well, I-- when he was detoxing, I didn't have a heat for six months. And he's always been possessive of me, and Pete could smell it on me, and I can smell it on him, you know? It's... you just _know_ these things, okay?"

Plus, he doesn't add, the only sex I've had that felt worth having was with him; even going into heat with an Alpha who tied with me, who put a baby inside me, doesn't compare to a couple of drunken hookups.

"That's hardly conclusive," she says, soft and warm. "Besides, a bonded Alpha would hardly let his Omega go off with another Alpha, now would he? And you were with Pete for several months?"

Mikey opens his mouth; he has no real response to that.

***

When he walks out of the office and turns on his Sidekick, Gerard's texted him that Pete's dating some girl now. It makes Mikey feel nauseous and stupid, makes him feel mean, so he calls Gerard up and says, blunt and cruel: "I'm pregnant. It's Pete's."

Gerard snarls into the phone, and Mikey can hear Frank demanding he give up the phone, and the ensuing scuffle. He smiles with vicious satisfaction, and thinks that if that isn't proof that he's bonded to Gerard, then nothing could be. Instead of going back to the mansion, he walks and walks and walks and checks himself into a hotel.

He flies back to New Jersey the next day, because there weren't any seats on the flight to Chicago and he needs.... he _needs_ ; he's one big ball of need and ache and confusion, and his mom takes one look at him and sends him to go shower while she makes him some supper.

"I love you," he tells her, because he doesn't know how to say it to anyone else, and in the shower he rubs his belly and hums and wonders whether his baby really will be beautiful or if it'll be just as fucked up as him and Gerard, as him and Pete.

“I love you too,” he whispers, but the baby can’t hear him yet.

When he emerges, skin red from the shower, his mom is on the phone and casting guilty looks in his direction that let him know she's called Gerard. He doesn't blame her-- he expects Gerard's been calling everyone to check up on him. He probably even called Pete.

She hangs up quickly and gives him a shaky smile.

"Mikey, baby," she says, and she pulls him into a hug. "My little boy."

Mikey sinks into it, into the way she still musses his hair and pats his back like he really is a little boy.

"Gerard doesn't know all of it," Mikey says, soft and scared. He wonders how much of this he can tell her, whether she'll really listen. The therapist who supposedly specialized in unwanted bonds hadn't.

"Of course he doesn't, sweetheart," his mom says. "The only person who does is you, right?"

"And Pete," Mikey says, and saying his name doesn't hurt, not like song lyrics have always led him to believe, but he still cringes away from it. Pete should have walked away long before he finally had, and Mikey was grateful he'd put up with him as long as he had.

"Pete's an Alpha dating a Beta," his mom replies. "He probably doesn't know all of it either."

"I'm not bonded to him," Mikey says.

"But you are bonded?" his mom asks, and it's so mild, so deceptive, that Mikey can hear himself in it, can hear the words she won't speak.

"I am. And pregnant. Those are both true."

"And... is your baby your bonded's child?" Mikey feels something sick churn in his gut, sick and mean and _hateful_.

"You _know_ ," he whispers, low and pained. "How long have you known?"

"Mikey--" she says, but he interrupts her, pushes away.

"How long?" he demands, glaring furiously at her.

"Since your first heat. I'm not that oblivious, Mikey."

"But... tell me he doesn't know. Tell me he--"

"Gerard only sees what he wants to see, baby. You know that."

"I--" he backs away from her, another step. She _knew_. He hates her with abrupt ferocity, and he's snarling at her, cornered and vulnerable the way only an Omega can be. She holds up her hands.

"I hate you," he says after a second, once his vocal cords are doing his bidding again. "I hate you right now." She nods.

"Mikey-- you can hate me, but... you can't ever tell Gerard, okay?"

He stares at her. "No," he whispers, and, "I quit."

"Mikey!" she cries, but he's already leaving, walking away again.

"I quit!" he yells, and he shifts his weight forward and runs.

Three blocks away and his Sidekick rings, and he only picks it up because it's not Gerard's ringtone.

"Mikeyway," Pete says, and he sounds surprised. "You answered!" It's the same simple delight he's always expressed on hearing from Mikey, and it makes Mikey slow to a walk.

"Yeah, hi."

"Gerard called me," Pete says, and Mikey nods.

"Yeah?"

"Apparently you ran away?"

"Yeah. I quit, I guess."

Pete is quiet. "Okay. Well. That's kind of big."

Mikey nods again.

"Do you want-- I mean, Ashlee and I moved in together, but there's a spare room."

"No," Mikey says, and he feels stronger for it. "No, I don't-- She's a Beta, so she would assume, and--"

"She wouldn't care," Pete protests.

"I do," Mikey replies, and then he gets to a bus stop, stares at the time table. There's a bus to the train station in four minutes, and from there he can get a train to Hoboken, reach Midtown in an hour and a half. He's sure he can get a job fairly quickly, doing _something_ that has nothing to do with his brother for the first time in his life.

"I love you, Mikeyway," Pete says, and Mikey stares at the time table for a few long seconds as it blurs and warps before his eyes. He blinks hard a couple of times.

"Love isn't enough in the face of biology," Mikey replies.

"No," Pete says. "It could be, but... Not for you, I guess."

Mikey doesn't really have anything to say to that.

"I wrote a song for you," Pete says, and he's trying to achieve something, prove something to Mikey. Mikey wants to yell at him, demand he just spit it out.

"No one's ever done that before."

"Liar," Pete says, and he sounds bitter and fond all at once. "Gerard writes all his songs for you."

"Gerard writes all of his songs for _himself_ ," Mikey protests.

"He's a bonded Alpha. It's the same difference, I promise."

Mikey sighs, checks his watch. Two minutes.

"You would know."

"I do. Daisychains, Mikeyway."

"Daisychains just rot and wither," Mikey snaps, angry. "They aren't promises."

Pete doesn't reply for a long minute, then a woman's voice, oddly familiar.

"He means it, you know."

"I know," Mikey says.

"It's my spare room too, and... I'll share it with you."

"I know," Mikey says again, because Betas are stupid about how Alphas and Omegas really work.

"Goodbye, Mikeyway." And it hurts more than all the rest combined, because that's what Pete calls him, and he can't have Gerard and he can't have Pete, but he can have some strange woman's sympathy in his ear? He hangs up the phone and flicks it off just as the bus pulls into the station.

***

Mikey still has friends in the city, and he gets a job at a grubby music store that's got walkup apartments over the top, and he sleeps on a mattress on the floor of a rented room and bitches about New York rent costs and revels in being able to order delivery at 4 am, and in being able to geek out over instruments and in no longer being the scene slut.

He keeps his pregnancy hidden in hoodies and steadily looser jeans, and doesn't check the blogs about his band.

He does buy tickets to an NYC promo show and asks for the night off, even though it gets him worried looks and an extra portion of someone's aunt's casserole, and he realizes he hasn't got anything big enough to mask the baby-belly that's also going to help him blend into the audience of one of his band's shows.

He realizes he's a masochist when he's staring at the Google map of New York with all the Hot Topics pinned with red pegs. He goes to the nearest one anyway, buys a Black Parade hoodie in their largest size, watches in the mirror as it dwarfs him.

Half the store staff is coming with him, and he's pretty sure that happened because they’re worried about him, but it's almost reassuring to be surrounded by Betas and one Omega, a buffer against the screaming, pulsing crowd. For some reason he doesn't remember the kids being this overwhelming before, but before he'd been separated from them by his band and Gerard, larger than life at the forefront of everything.

It's hot and sweaty and ridiculously fun; a smaller venue than they'd play on a full tour. He forgets where he is for stretches, caught up in his brother's voice and Frank's crazy guitar improvisation and the way the drums curl through everything, sure and strong.

But then he's cramping up bad, and grabbing his knees and screaming from pain. It pierces through the crowd, and a bubble of silence starts to expand out from them, even as Mikey breathes through the agony.

Right. He can't keep the baby inside him indefinitely. He probably should have considered that at some point since he'd realized he was carrying it.

"Fuck," he says, and he's hoarse already, breathing harsh and desperate. A pair of the venue’s security guards is wading through the crowd, even as Gerard notices the weird silence.

"Everyone okay out there?" Gerard's asking, and the whole room is quietening, bizarre and anticipatory. "Do we need to hit the lights?"

The next moment, the contraction intensifies, and Mikey hits his knees on the filthy floor just as security gets to him. He remembers, vaguely, that women have long, slow labors, and he wonders why Omegas can't have that too, with contractions starting out barely noticeable and lasting only a few seconds at first.

"It's okay," one of the security people hollers. "Just an Omega in labor," like it happens all the time, and Mikey snarls up at him, teeth bared and a growl in his throat. "It's okay," the guy repeats, hands up. "Which one of you is his Alpha, huh?"

"Uh..." he hears one of his group say, and then Gerard jumps off the stage and the crowd starts to surge and mumble, and he stares right at Gerard the whole time he's walking, unable to focus on anything but the afterimage of intense pain and the scent of Gerard, leaking pheromones and urgency that overwhelm the rest of the crowd's scent.

"Gee," he says, and he pulls himself to his feet just as Gerard breaks through, and the security people are yelling at each other, and he stumbles forward two steps so he's pressed up against Gerard like he belongs.

"Mikey, shh, what the hell?" he demands, and then security is closing ranks around them and ushering them backstage, but all he really notices is that his baby's coming and that Gerard has hold of him like he won't let go.

"Someone should call Pete Wentz," Gerard says authoritatively. "That's his bonded Alpha."

"No he's not," Mikey says. "It's not Pete."

"What?" Gerard demands, stopping short. "But you're definitely bonded. I can _smell it._ Anyone can smell it!"

"Not Betas," Mikey points out, feeling giddy.

"If it isn't Pete, then... Frank thinks it's Brian."

Mikey shakes his head. 

"Mikey, Mikes, I have to finish this show." 

Mikey nods. "One more set?" he says, and it comes out pleading.

"One more set. You guys get my brother whatever he asks for, okay? Anything he wants. And I guess time the contractions? For when we go to the hospital. They'll ask about that, I think."

"Got it," one of them says, and then he's being settled into a couch and has Gerard's lips on his forehead and then... then it's him and techs he's fucked a dozen times and a mix of venue security and their own people and he curls into a ball in his too-large hoodie and wonders if he should text Pete.

He pulls out his Sidekick and stares at it for a few long moments before punching out "sorry what i said daisychains are real too"

The reply he gets is instant and reassuring.

"im not stupid, i figured that out before u even hung up"

and after a few moments.

"r u ok because gossip says you collapsed at a show in nyc. i don't believe it because u arent touring but still"

"fine" Mikey types even though now would be a good time to tell Pete. He just... can't. He won't.

"k love u"

Mikey still can't say it back.

He has four more contractions before the show's over, and the fourth one has him rolling off the couch and onto the floor, keening miserably and biting the hand that reaches to help him. He wants Gerard, or Pete, or even Frank or Ray, but not _these_ with their familiar-strange scents and false sympathy.

His band comes off the stage soaked in sweat and high off the performance, and instantly swarms around him, chattering at each other and demanding someone get them to a hospital.

Ray's the one who takes a moment to ask where Mikey's been getting his prenatal care, and Mikey has to tell him he _hasn't_ , which makes Ray scowl darkly before deciding, loudly and unilaterally, that the baby's going to be born in New Jersey, if they have any say in it. Gerard and Frank instantly agree, and it's like he never left, with Bob scooping him up like a doll and putting their plan into action. That's just about when the fifth contraction hits and he blacks out, only to come to sitting in the back of a car and sobbing like a child.

"This sucks," he says, and everyone mumbles agreements except Gerard, who's scowling.

"Figures you'd spring this shit on me when you're in _labor_ and I can't even be mad at you."

Mikey stares at him. His whole life has been spent revolving around Gerard, and in this moment he hates him, every fiber of his being focused on all-consuming loathing.

"You know when I got this sprung on me?" he asks, and he can’t believe that he's actually having this conversation, not now, not in public. But Gerard started it, and for once in his _goddamned life_ Mikey's going to finish it.

"Mikey," Gerard says in his best conciliatory tones.

"No. Guess. I _dare_ you. Because it wasn't last week. It wasn't even nine months ago when the best chance I had at love walked out on me because of it," because I couldn't deal with it, he mentally adds with a guilty, self-recriminatory smile. "Guess."

"Mikey, I don't..."

Mikey surges upright, and that loathing intensifies until it's a black morass, eating him up and spitting him back out piece by piece.

"Dude," Frank said. "It's _totally_ Brian, isn't it?"

And Frank is _so close_ with that assessment that Mikey has to laugh, and Gerard stares at him with growing horror.

"That... that was _years_ ago, Mikey. You should have gotten help before it got this bad, you should have _told_ someone."

"No," Mikey said. "No, because see, when I realized, I realized it had been years and years. Didn't you ever wonder why I never presented as Omega until that first heat? None of the signs and symptoms?"

And Gerard _had_ , Mikey could see, the way he drew back and hunched in. He'd wondered and Mikey could see that he'd never allowed himself to arrive at the logical conclusion. Mikey’s glad he never made that promise to their mother.

"Gerard Way," Mikey says. "You're the best sex I've ever had and you don't even remember it." He is apparently the sort of person who will rip a wing off a dragonfly to see it wander around in circles.

It's not as dramatic a moment as it could be. None of the band reels back or gasps in horror, but Gerard goes white and Mikey can see the way he's broken Frank's heart by the pain and humiliation in his eyes.

And he doesn't know how to fix that, exactly, but he tries, he says "the baby's still Pete's though," and Frank's face clears a little. "Sorry," he adds, and it should have been misinterpreted, but Frank leans forward and squeezes his hand and another contraction washes over him so he grips it tight and it anchors him.

"Love you," he says, because no matter how much the words hurt him, coming out finally, they're all here and they all have wanted to hear it from him at one time or another. "But I'm a fucking Omega, and gender means... it means..."

"I love you too," Frank replies, and he means it, Mikey can tell.

"Fuck gender, seriously," Gerard says. "Fuck sex, fuck bonding and societal expectations. That's the point, isn't it?"

Ray gives Gerard a mild look, and says "I love you too, Mikey."

Gerard starts, like he'd forgotten he had an audience for his rant, and replies "Yeah, sure I love you. You're my _Mikey_." And Mikey smiles for him, and the hatred ebbs a bit under the force of hearing Gerard say it back.

"But, what about Pete? Shouldn't we call him?" Bob asks and he has his phone out.

"Yeah," Mikey says. "Probably should."

But the call goes to voicemail and then they're at the hospital and rolling him into surgery for a caesarean because natural birth as an Omega is a bitch, according to the maternity nurse who outlines his options.

Mikey lays awake and numb and they pull the baby from him, and when she starts screaming so does he because it feels like dying and being in heat and being wrapped up in Gerard's scent, strong and empty and wonderful and horrible all at once, but the hospital's big enough they have an Omega's counselor on hand to deal with Omega births, and he comes in immediately with soothing words and a towel to wrap his little girl in so she can lay on Mikey's chest while they measure her heartbeat and cut her umbilical cord.

Her lung function is quite obviously fine, he thinks through the haze. He kisses her red forehead the way Gerard always kisses his, and thinks of daisychains in the summertime.

Frank comes in with his camera and an evil grin and Mikey lays back and lets him take as many pictures as he wants, even once Gerard comes in and curls around him and his daughter on the awful hospital bed. The counselor suggests that Alphas not be present for a while, unless Mikey's bonded, and the band just laughs and tells him they're fine, really, but he doesn't let up until Mikey relaxes into Gerard's embrace.

Frank's messing with a laptop and his phone and his camera, and he says "Does she have a name?"

Mikey doesn't think or hesitate, he just says "Daisy, Daisy Way," and Gerard nods and says it's perfect, solemn and serious, and they all grin a little but only where he can't see it, and Frank's post, Mikey will find out later, says 'welcome to the world, daisy way. our band has a baby!'

Pete calls five minutes later, and Mikey looks around for his Sidekick, confused and tired. Frank hands it to him, and he answers it.

"You're fine, are you?" Pete asks, and his voice is dry and angry, cold tones seeping into the cracks between his words and making Mikey shiver.

"I-- am now?" he says, for lack of a better reply.

"You have a baby? Or is it Gerard's and Frank's? Because it's hard to tell from context, but Frank never looked like he was hiding a pregnancy, and you're the one holding it, and Omegas are weirdly territorial about these things."

"Pete--"

"You named her _Daisy?_ " Pete asks, and there's the hurt that the cold was masking.

"Pete," Mikey says again.

"I mean, I knew, I knew I couldn't... but you couldn't have picked something else? Surely your brother has a thousand stupid ideas and none of them are... none of--" Pete chokes on the words, and he's crying, Mikey can tell, and his heart is breaking all over again, and he knows Gerard can sense it too, in his scent or his demeanor, because all at once he and Daisy are being pulled in close and safe, but Pete's all alone and he won't slow down to listen.

"Pete, she's... It's... You remember, right, that conversation?" The one that pushed you away for once and for all? he doesn't add. Doesn't have to.

"Of course I fucking remember, Mikey! I'm not as stupid as everyone-- I'm not stupid, okay?"

"Then fucking _listen_ already, you asshole!" Mikey snaps, and the whole room goes quiet, staring at him. Pete shuts up, which doesn't mean he's listening, but Mikey will take what he can get.

"The question I asked, the one that ruined it? The answer is yes. It's... it's totally possible."

Pete doesn't reply.

"I didn't... I didn't know how to tell you. I didn't know what words to use."

"You even consider just saying 'Hey, Pete, I'm pregnant with our love-child'?" Pete asks, and Mikey shivers again.

"That wouldn't have... no. You're right. I didn't. But, I was... I'm kinda fucked up."

"This is true, Mikeyway," Pete says, and his voice is strengthening, and Mikey thinks maybe he's not crying anymore.

"Sorry," he says.

"Not even close to good enough. Where are you?"

Mikey gives Pete the hospital name and Pete hangs up on him without a goodbye and Mikey manages to hold out long enough to watch the nurse attempt to shoo a pair of territorial Alphas, an Omega, and Bob out of his room. It's almost funny how easily she gives in, really.

***

Mikey passes the night in a sort of dazed quietude, drifting between sleeping nightmares and turgid waking hatred (most of which is self-directed, at this point,) and waking up fully so he can take the bottles of formula the nurse gives him to feed Daisy, tiny and sleepy in his arms.

Gerard wonders idly aloud how Omegas nursed their children back before mass-produced formula, and his musing soothes Mikey into the early hours of the morning, when Pete bursts in, hair sticking straight up and a tray of coffee in each hand, and there is a nurse trailing behind him looking scandalized, and Mikey wants more pain-meds soon because getting up is like having a shard of glass shoved through his gut.

"Pete," Mikey says, feeling muzzy and slow. He smiles, because _Pete_ , and Daisy is stirring in his arms like she knows her other daddy's there to hold her, and Pete glares at him.

"You are not forgiven, Mikeyway," Pete says, but he's handing out coffees and he got one for Mikey and he called him Mikeyway, which is almost the same as forgiveness, so he pulls away from Gerard who is having a moment with his coffee and offers Daisy up. She fusses without his heartbeat, but Pete doesn't waste time setting aside the empty coffee trays and taking his daughter with greedy hands, as soon as she's against his chest she settles again, sighing and blinking at the world around her.

The nurse stops fluttering and Mikey realizes in the back of his head that it's because she, like everyone else, assumes Pete's his bonded Alpha. He'll worry about that later. For now, he's got Pete and Pete loves Daisy with the same fierce intensity Mikey does (he can tell), and it's easy to step forward, to speak, stumbling and hesitant.

"I don't... I don't deserve you to forgive me," he says, "But, you said, you said daisychains no matter what, and, I couldn't-- I _wouldn't_ believe you, but, but this is blood, and it's better than a promise, I think, and it's all I've got. So. I'm sorry."

Pete sighs and rocks on his feet, a soothing, instinctive motion. "Shut up," he says, and "I wrote you a song," and "You're a little fucked up, Mikeyway."

Mikey can't parse the meaning any better this time than he could on the phone those months ago, but that's okay, because Gerard's there, as he always is, the axis Mikey's world will forever revolve around, and he says, "Mikey loves you too, Pete Wentz. I wrote a song about it for him. He's not good at words though."

"Words matter one helluva lot, Geeway," Pete says, but his glare is softening.

"Yeah, but that's why he's got me," Gerard says. It sounds almost like a threat.

Pete grips Daisy tight, and she's a bond of blood between them, a promise that can't ever be broken.

"Okay, Mikey. Okay," he whispers, and Mikey steps forward to kiss his daughter's head, and Pete wraps his free arm around him, and Gerard looks fierce across the room with his coffee and his confidence, and Mikey thinks maybe being fucked up is okay after all.

**Author's Note:**

> Inoru spawned this thing in a couple of ways, so I'm blaming it entirely on her. Two things that she said that impacted this fic a great deal were that Omegaverse fics that she could find weren't dub-conny enough, and that there weren't any in bandom. I decided to change those two things. (My first response to the latter complaint was: "That's ridiculous because of course Mikey and Gerard have been bonded since they were born!")


End file.
